ON MAIN SECTORS OF EASTERN FRONT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 22 August 1941, Page 5

ON MAIN SECTORS OF EASTERN FRONT

Destruction of Great Dam on Dnieper Reported INUNDATION OF IMMENSE AREA CONTINUING THREAT TO LENINGRAD LONDON. August 21. Once again the news from the Russian front speaks of - three great battles, separated from each other by distances of about 400 miles—in the Ukraine, in the central sector, and in the area round Leningrad. In the north the Germans are pushing as hard as they can towards Leningrad. In the central sector they are trying to turn the defences of the Dnieper and in the south they are at grips with the last of the Russian rearguard forces. The attack on Odessa is described as one of the fiercest and most memorable of the war. The latest report from the north, given by the Berlin correspondent of a Swedish newspaper, says the enemy last night at one point were only 12 miles from Leningrad, but the most advanced point claimed in the latest German communique is 70 miles away. The German communique says the latest advance was made only after several days of bitter fighting against positions heavily fortified and stubbornly defended. In the central sector, the Russians are following up the success reported yesterday, when airborne tanks and infantry attacked the German rear. The Germans claim the capture of a town at the mouth of the Dnieper, on the western bank. This point is a considerable distance east of Odessa, but the evacuation of the town, it is believed, is part of a deliberate Soviet policy. German and Italian reports speak of the heavy bombing of Odessa port installations and shipping in the harbour. Before the Russians evacuated Nikolaev they blew up warships under construction in the stocks of the dockyard. Russian guerillas have adopted a new method of attacking the Germans, by using motor-boats on the Dniester. The motorboats suddenly dart out of their places of hiding among the reeds and attack German barges, rafts, etc., the crews of the latter being killed and the craft captured.